


War In My Head

by bucketofbarnes



Series: Shiro Week 2016 [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Child Death, Contains Some Pretty Dark Content, Gen, Minor Character Death, Shiro (Voltron) Angst, Shiro (Voltron)'s Missing Year, Shiro (Voltron)-centric, Sorry Not Sorry, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Violence, Why Do We Torment Him So?, poor shiro
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-22
Updated: 2016-11-22
Packaged: 2018-09-01 10:44:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8621455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bucketofbarnes/pseuds/bucketofbarnes
Summary: Again and again, they tried to defeat him in the arena. They never did.No one ever won in a fight against him.Or: A peek inside Shiro's head during his year in the arena.Fill for Shiro Week 2016. Day 2 - Champion/Leadership





	

Terror. Pain. Blood. Death.

Terror. Pain Blood. Death.

Terror. Pain. Blood. Death.

It was a cycle that repeated itself over and over again, in which he was dragged from his cell, and thrown into that damned arena once more. To fight a creature that was not always one of Haggar’s creations, that was sometimes a prisoner just like him, that trembled with eyes like a deer in headlights, trying desperately to fight him. To win.

They never did.

No one ever won in a fight against him.

Even in the hours, sometimes even days, that he was kept in his cell, he could picture their faces, hear their voices begging for mercy, smell their blood that was spattering onto his body and running from his hands. A small, vindictive part of him seethed with hate when he thought of Matt, of his friend that didn’t have to fight in the arena, who was with his father, had someone with him who he knew and who could comfort him. In the next moment, he was disgusted with himself. How could he think that? It was his choice to make sure that Matt didn’t have to fight, to do what at the time he was certain would result in his own death. He had wanted Matt to be as safe as possible, to be with his father. How could he think that? What was wrong with him?

He found that with time, those feelings began to leave him. The feelings that left him sobbing in his cell, wishing for a shower to wash the blood from his body, to scrub himself raw even though he knew that even then he still wouldn’t feel clean.

It made the fights easier.

However, he found that a small part of him still screamed at him. Howled in despair as another died by his hands, wailed with every cut made, every bone broken. A part of him that almost overwhelmed him with disgust. How could he be okay with this? His mind demanded. These people were dying in agony because of him. He should be feeling guilty, he should be sobbing into the cold, dirty, metal floors of his cell. He deserved to suffer. He deserved to die.  
So many times he had almost given into that voice. The voice telling him to drop his sword. To stand and let the claws hit him, to destroy him, to end his miserable life so that no one else would be hurt, to fight back the only way that he could.

He listened only once. The claws of another of Haggar’s monsters hit him, slicing through the skin and muscle of his arm, shattering the bone, spraying the walls of the arena with his blood while the audience screamed in joy, screamed for more blood.

Things had blurred together after that. He remembered lying on the dusty floor of the arena, his sight blurry, barely able to feel the pain, but able to see the puddle of red slowly blooming underneath him, soaking into the dirt. It was so bright, so red, so different from the purple that he saw everyday. It was so beautiful. A smile crept onto his face, and his eyes slipped closed as he embraced the approaching darkness.

He was never granted the peace that he sought. He woke on a cold metal table with the druids looming over him, with the disorientating feeling of both being unable to feel his arm, and feeling pain that he had never felt before. His eyes slid down to a cold metal object resting next to him, and for a while, his mind refused to accept what he was seeing. A small part of him wanted to cackle hysterically, because this couldn’t be happening. It couldn’t. This was all just a bad dream. He was still in his cell. Better yet, he was still on Earth. His parents were just down the hall fast asleep.

That sweet, sweet delusion was shattered as he attempted to move, and the metal object - his arm, oh God, his arm - moved with him. Pain shot through him, and he thought he screamed, before the darkness won again and he lost consciousness, the last thing he saw being Haggar’s glowing yellow eyes and white, jagged grin.

His first fight after receiving the arm was also the most horrific. The opponent that he was given to fight was not a creature, not a disgraced Galra soldier, not a trembling prisoner with fear in their eyes, but the will to fight in their hands grasping a sword. 

No. It was a child.

A small, shivering child that took one look at him and began to cry. Tears pouring down the child’s face, and loud wails practically echoing around the arena. How was it that he had become a monster that made children cry at the mere sight of him?

He had refused to kill the child, refusing to be that kind of monster. And his refusal had resulted in a shot being fired at the child, hitting it somewhere that ensured that it would die slowly. Painfully. He had stared in shock as the child lay on the floor, unable to move, barely able to breathe. There would be no medical attention for this child. The Galra were practically foaming at the mouth, screaming for him to kill the child, bellowing, laughing. He stared at this child that looked up at him with tears in its eyes and blood pooling around it, and he made his decision.

He cared even less about the fights afterwards. Each fight seemed to blur into one, each face, each cry of pain, all of the blood. What did it matter any more? These people would die, if not by his hand, then by the hand of Galra soldiers who would finish them off afterwards as they were too injured to either fight or work in the labour camps. Death was the best mercy that he could give these people. They just didn’t understand, that if they survived, if they killed him in the arena, they would become him. They didn’t understand. And he would never want them too.

There was no saving him, no mercy, no escape, no sweet release from this existence. Takashi Shirogane was dead. He had died the moment that he had killed that child, stopping it from dying a slow death. The only comfort that he could give.

All that was left was The Champion.

And he would survive.

**Author's Note:**

> Fill for Shiro Week 2016. Day 2 - Champion/Leadership
> 
> A special thanks to BossToaster for taking the time to reassure me that this wasn’t TOO dark. 
> 
> You can see more Voltron content, or make requests by following my tumblr: bucketofbarnes.tumblr.com/


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